Frankie Hejduk needs a place to live. His wife and kids are arriving next week from Columbus, Ohio, and he’s still holed up in a Manhattan Beach hotel.

L.A. GALAXY vs. TIJUANA XOLOS

What: International soccer exhibition. The Galaxy is in preseason. The Xolos are midway through the Clausura season of Mexico’s second division.

Site/time: 7 p.m. Wednesday/USD’s Torero Stadium

Who: The first teams from both clubs are expected to see action, including David Beckham and Landon Donovan for the Galaxy. The Xolos have Sweetwater High alum Joe Corona.

Tickets: Available at the Jenny Craig Pavilion box office at USD.

“I’m doing it old school,” Hejduk says of the home search. “I’m riding around on my skateboard, pulling down for-rent signs and calling people. I’ve got my gravity board and I’m just cruising around.

“I remember doing that in college, riding around and looking for a place to live. It’s 15, 20 years later, and I’m doing the exact same thing.”

Sometimes life is laid out in a straight line from point to point, or a sometimes along a meandering path. And sometimes it is a neat circle, returning to the place where you started.

The circle closes for Hejduk at 7 tonight when the Los Angeles Galaxy, his latest stop in Major League Soccer, plays the Tijuana Xolos in a preseason exhibition at USD’s Torero Stadium. Hejduk grew up in Cardiff, played for the La Jolla Nomads, attended San Dieguito High, even had annual games at Torero Stadium with UCLA.

“I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way,” says Hejduk, 36. “It’s pretty amazing how it all worked out, where I could get back home and get back to my roots. I’m really psyched about it. To be back home where it all began, I think every player wants that, to be honest.”

In the intervening two decades, he has scripted one of the most illustrious careers in American soccer history. Hejduk is the only U.S. player to appear in every Olympics and World Cup between 1996 and 2002; he would have been in the 2006 World Cup had he not torn knee ligaments the day after being named to the team, and in retrospect he probably should have been selected to the 2010 roster as well.

He played for the Tampa Bay Mutiny in MLS’s inaugural season in 1996, then for Bayer Leverkusen of Germany’s famed Bundesliga, then for Swiss club St. Gallen, then for the Columbus Crew the past eight seasons.

But the Crew opted not to renew his contract and those of some other veterans, casting Hejduk into MLS’s new version of free agency (which really isn’t free agency). Players go into a re-entry draft in early December, and whichever team picks them has exclusive negotiating rights.

Galaxy coach Bruce Arena, who has stocked his roster with former national-team players he coached in the 2002 and 2006 World Cups, expressed interest in Hejduk, and Hejduk reciprocated the sentiment. Everything seemed to be set.

Until draft day came and Sporting Kansas City, picking six spots before the Galaxy, took Hejduk.